Wednesday, January 17, 2018

Hot! Live! U2sic!

You’re The Best Thing About Me…..Get Out Of Your Own Way
The band is making the promotional rounds for “Songs Of Experience,” and when I say the band, I really mean mostly Bono and Edge, with a few helpings of Adam Clayton along the way.  Is Larry Mullen just taking his “don’t talk much” thing to a new extreme, or what?  (At least when Larry talks, he avoids making asinine comments about rock music being “girly,” unlike some other people in the band.)  In a related lack-of-Larry story, it’s also perhaps a bit concerning that all of these promo appearance performances sound really good when the songs are performed either acoustically (i.e. here), or with a full orchestra (i.e. U2’s recent BBC concert).  The jury is still out on how most of the SOE songs when it’s just the band in their normal state, though I guess we’ll find that out on the tour.


North Star
Speaking of stripped-down performances, I found this YouTube listing of U2 “acoustic sessions,” which seems like it’s mostly just cribbed from various live performances over the years.  Whatever the source, they sound lovely.  I’ll include “North Star” since it’s a hidden gem of U2’s library that has never really been properly released apart from (of all places) the Transformers 2 soundtrack.


Kite
A lovely old version of “Kite” from the Vertigo Tour, at a show Cate Blanchett apparently intended.  Wouldn’t shock me to see this song get dusted off for the coming tour, given the heavy SOE focus on parenthood.  Will I end up sitting or standing next to Cate Blanchett at the concert I'll be attending? Who's to say (where the wind will take you...)?

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